How to Catch a Duke (Rogues to Riches #6) - Grace Burrowes Page 0,74
you,” she murmured, feeling her husband’s weight settle beside her. “Was it awful?”
From the earliest months of their marriage, Quinn had been sparing with words and lavish with physical affection, at least in private. Jane usually fell asleep with Quinn spooned at her back and woke curled against his side.
“The evening was long without you,” he said, moving closer. He rested his head on her shoulder. “The baby was asleep when I looked in on her.”
“Sleeping off her latest banquet.”
Normally, Quinn would offer at least a cursory report: Some retired admiral had been in his cups before the dancing opened, a dowager countess had been accused of cheating at cards. He kept track of the trivialities because often, those on dits had financial repercussions and his banks served many titled families.
“Is Stephen all right?” Jane asked, for polite society had doubtless remarked Stephen’s presence with more curiosity than compassion.
Never in more than a decade of marriage had Quinn asked that of her. She threaded an arm under his neck and pulled him close.
“Quinn, are you well?”
“I am heartsick for my brother.”
Jane waited, because surely even Quinn would embellish such an admission.
“All these years,” he said, “I’ve thought Stephen spoiled—a contrary, self-indulgent, arrogant, difficult fellow who simply could not put behind him an injury that resulted in nothing more than a bad knee. Jack Wentworth scarred us all, and Stephen spent less time around Jack than any of us.”
Ah, well then. In Jane’s opinion, Jack Wentworth was capable of greater evil than Old Scratch himself. Mention of him would turn any conversation melancholy. Jane stroked Quinn’s hair and drew the covers up over his shoulders.
“You and Stephen were discussing the past?” A difficult topic for any Wentworth.
Quinn hitched closer, and Jane was glad the candles were out and the fire was banked. This was not a conversation to have in daylight.
“All along,” Quinn said, “I thought: My brother is so disgustingly smart. From the kites he makes for the girls to the modifications he’s designed for his saddle, to the cannons and rifles and even a bedamned crossbow. Everything he touches is brilliant. Stephen has so much intelligence, I thought, why must he be bitter about an unreliable knee? Get the hell over it and move on. I was jealous of him. He can read in any language he pleases to, he’s charming, he’s stylish.…”
Another sigh, this one a tad shuddery.
“He loves you, and you love him, Quinn. The rest can all be sorted out.”
A silence stretched, while some strange tension gripped Quinn.
“The problem,” he said, in a near whisper. “The problem was never the bloody knee. What Jack Wentworth shattered was Stephen’s heart.”
Quinn held her in a desperately close embrace, and when Jane stroked his hair again, her thumb grazed Quinn’s cheek. She kept up a slow, easy caress, until his breathing quieted, and his hold on her relaxed.
Only then did Jane admit what her senses told her must be true: Quinton, His Grace of Walden, had cried himself to sleep.
Abigail’s evening had been a revelation, and not a happy one. If she’d entertained any wild fancies about eventually fitting into Stephen Wentworth’s world, they’d died a waltzing, flirting, bejeweled death.
Mayfair was not simply a different strata of society, Abigail reflected as she drew the covers up over herself, it was a different world, and not one she could comprehend. The cost of the ice sculptures alone would have housed many a lamed or blinded veteran. The price of a half dozen pairs of embroidered dancing slippers would have bought many a crossing sweeper a decent pair of boots.
Stephen navigated this perfumed and silk-clad world with ease, for all he needed a cane to get around. His flirtatious ripostes had been humorous without touching the hem of ribaldry, and he knew everybody. All Abigail knew was that a Quaker gunsmith’s daughter had no place among Stephen’s peers.
Everybody in the ballroom had known him, and they’d approached him with the sort of nervous jocularity that indicated respect and more than a little wariness. He was at home in that jungle, and Abigail never would be.
She punched her pillow and admitted that, but for Stephen Wentworth, she would have no wish to learn how to prowl the wilds of Mayfair.
Her bedroom door opened silently and a particular, uneven tread came to her ears.
“You are not asleep,” Stephen said, sitting on the bed. “And I am not tossing the rest of the